Tougher Actions Against Swaggart Rejected, Church Officials Confirm

Louisiana Assemblies of God church leaders have rejected a request by national church officials that they reconsider their sanction against television evangelist Jimmy Swaggart, a church official confirmed Tuesday.

The official, who asked to remain anonymous, said the 19-member state presbytery decided to send back its original censure barring Swaggart from preaching for three months. That decision came Monday during a nine-hour meeting at Louisiana district headquarters in Alexandria, La., the source said.

The Louisiana Presbytery’s original sanction was a two-year rehabilitation program that also included counseling for Swaggart, who heads a ministry that reportedly has an annual income of $150 million.

Swaggart stepped down from the pulpit Feb. 21, telling the congregation at his Baton Rouge worship center in a tearful confession that he had sinned against his family and God. Swaggart reportedly paid a prostitute to pose naked for him and then tried to make a deal with a minister who confronted him about it.

The latest development in the scandal surfaced in a story by KATC-TV in Lafayette, La. The station said it had also learned that the national presbytery had recommended barring Swaggart from the pulpit and television for a year, with an additional year of regulation of his ministry afterwards.

A Louisiana Assemblies of God official contacted by The Associated Press Tuesday night confirmed that the state panel had sent its previous sanction back to the national council. The official talked only under conditions he not be identified.